U.S. patent application number 16/314435 was filed with the patent office on 2019-10-17 for radio frequency interconnection device.
The applicant listed for this patent is INTERDIGITAL CE PATENT HOLDINGS. Invention is credited to Anthony AUBIN, Jean-Marc LE FOULGOC, Dominique LO HINE TONG.
Application Number | 20190319329 16/314435 |
Document ID | / |
Family ID | 56567543 |
Filed Date | 2019-10-17 |
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United States Patent
Application |
20190319329 |
Kind Code |
A1 |
LO HINE TONG; Dominique ; et
al. |
October 17, 2019 |
RADIO FREQUENCY INTERCONNECTION DEVICE
Abstract
An interconnection system is described including a first printed
circuit board, the first printed circuit board including a first
portion of a filter, the filter used to communicate a signal
between the first printed circuit board and a second printed
circuit board, and a mechanical structure for coupling the signal
between the first printed circuit board and the second printed
circuit board, the second printed circuit board being oriented at
an angle with respect to the first printed circuit board.
Inventors: |
LO HINE TONG; Dominique;
(RENNES, FR) ; AUBIN; Anthony; (BOURGBARRE,
FR) ; LE FOULGOC; Jean-Marc; (BOURGBARRE,
FR) |
|
Applicant: |
Name |
City |
State |
Country |
Type |
INTERDIGITAL CE PATENT HOLDINGS |
PARIS |
|
FR |
|
|
Family ID: |
56567543 |
Appl. No.: |
16/314435 |
Filed: |
June 27, 2017 |
PCT Filed: |
June 27, 2017 |
PCT NO: |
PCT/EP2017/065917 |
371 Date: |
December 30, 2018 |
Current U.S.
Class: |
1/1 |
Current CPC
Class: |
H05K 2201/1031 20130101;
H05K 1/0237 20130101; H05K 2201/044 20130101; H01P 1/203 20130101;
H05K 3/366 20130101; Y02P 70/611 20151101; H01P 3/08 20130101; H05K
1/0233 20130101; H05K 1/14 20130101; H01P 5/02 20130101; H05K
2201/09254 20130101; H01P 1/2039 20130101 |
International
Class: |
H01P 5/02 20060101
H01P005/02; H01P 1/203 20060101 H01P001/203; H01P 3/08 20060101
H01P003/08; H05K 1/14 20060101 H05K001/14; H05K 1/02 20060101
H05K001/02 |
Foreign Application Data
Date |
Code |
Application Number |
Jun 30, 2016 |
EP |
16305824.1 |
Claims
1. An interconnection system, comprising; a first printed circuit
board, the first printed circuit board including a first portion of
a filter, the filter used to communicate a signal between the first
printed circuit board and a second printed circuit board; and a
metal clip formed of curved strips for coupling the signal between
the first printed circuit board and the second printed circuit
board, the second printed circuit board being oriented at an angle
with respect to the first printed circuit board.
2. The interconnection system according to claim 1, wherein said
filter is a bandpass filter.
3. The interconnection system according to claim 2, wherein said
bandpass filter is a symmetric radio frequency wideband bandpass
filter.
4. The interconnection system according to claim 1, wherein said
metal clip provides a coupling using two electrical interface
connections.
5. The interconnection system according to claim 4, wherein one of
said two electrical interface connections is for said signal.
6. (canceled)
7. The interconnection system according to claim 1, wherein said
angle is an acute angle.
8. The interconnection system according to claim 1, wherein said
angle is a right angle.
9. The interconnection system according to claim 1, wherein said
first printed circuit board includes a first transmission line
connected to a first I/O port, wherein said first transmission line
terminated in an intermediate terminating pad, said intermediate
terminating pad being spaced apart from a first grounding pad.
10. The interconnection system according to claim 9, wherein said
second printed circuit board includes a third transmission line
that is connected to a second grounding pad, said second grounding
pad located directly above said first grounding pad, said third
transmission line also connected to an output line at an
intersection point, wherein said third transmission line is a
micro-strip line.
11. The interconnection system according to claim 9, wherein said
first transmission line is about one half-wavelength long.
12. The interconnection system according to claim 9 wherein said
first transmission line is straight.
13. The interconnection system according to claim 1, wherein said
first transmission line is meandering.
14. The interconnection system according to claim 9, wherein a
distance between said intermediate terminating pad and said first
grounding pad is between 100 and 200 .mu.m.
15. The interconnection system according to claim 9, wherein said
first transmission line is one of a micro-strip line, a coplanar
line, a strip-line or a multilayer line and wherein said second
transmission line is one of a micro-strip line, a coplanar line, a
strip-line or a multilayer line and wherein said first grounding
pad and said intermediate terminating pad are printed on an outer
surface of said first circuit board.
16. An electronic device, comprising at least two printed circuit
boards, wherein two of the at least two printed circuit boards use
the radio frequency interconnection system according to claim 1.
Description
FIELD
[0001] The proposed apparatus (device) is directed to a radio
frequency interconnection device that enables the interconnection
of two circuit boards (for example, main printed circuit boards
PCBs)) arranged, for example, perpendicularly.
BACKGROUND
[0002] This section is intended to introduce the reader to various
aspects of art, which may be related to the present embodiments
that are described below. This discussion is believed to be helpful
in providing the reader with background information to facilitate a
better understanding of the various aspects of the present
disclosure. Accordingly, it should be understood that these
statements are to be read in this light.
[0003] FIG. 1 shows the mechanical architecture of a device that
contains four circuit boards interconnected to each other. In FIG.
1, the Wi-Fi and the DVB-T front-end boards are interconnected to
the circuit board through an interconnected board and by using
three Peripheral Component Interconnect express (PCIe) connectors.
FIG. 1, in particular, depicts a device having several circuit
boards that are perpendicular to each other and are interconnected
using conventional Peripheral Component Interconnect express (PCIe)
connectors.
[0004] FIG. 2 shows a set top box having several circuit boards
that are perpendicular to each other and are interconnected using
conventional Peripheral Component Interconnect express (PCIe)
connectors. In FIG. 2, the set top box also includes four circuit
boards. A circuit board is disposed horizontally and the three
other circuit boards (Wi-Fi, front-end and interface boards) are
perpendicular to the circuit board. The board-to-board
interconnection between the circuit boards is also accomplished in
FIG. 2 by using Peripheral Component Interconnect express
connectors.
[0005] As known in the art, common multi-pins connectors, such as
Peripheral Component Interconnect express connectors, cannot be
used to transmit radio frequency (RF) signals because of the
inherent high impedance mismatching that impairs the integrity of
the radio frequency signals. In the radio frequency field, to avoid
impedance mismatching when transmitting a signal between circuit
boards (board-to-board (B2B)), alternative solutions must be
adopted.
[0006] FIG. 3 depicts two circuit boards that are arranged parallel
to each other and which are interconnected using a metal part, an
element of which is electromagnetically coupled to the
board-to-board (circuit board to circuit board) grounding screw.
The electromagnetic coupling to the grounding screw ensures
wideband impedance matching.
[0007] When two circuit boards are disposed orthogonally to each
other, several state-of-the-art solutions can be used to transmit
circuit board to circuit board (B2B) radio frequency signals. The
most common interconnection solution is the use of a coaxial cable.
Indeed, with the drastic cost constraints in terms of design of new
electronic devices, using a coaxial cable is prohibitively
costly.
[0008] FIG. 4 shows two circuit boards that are perpendicular to
each other and which are interconnected by pins (G, S, G)
integrated into the vertical circuit board 405. The pins (G, S, G)
of the vertical circuit board fit into holes 425 of the horizontal
circuit board 410. The vertical circuit board has a ground plane
420 and the horizontal circuit board also has a ground plane 415.
Using pins integrated to the vertical circuit board can also be
applied to circuit board to circuit board (board-to-board (B2B)
interconnection of radio frequency signals. FIG. 4 shows an example
of circuit boards perpendicular to each other, where the vertical
board 405 contains three pins (one signal pin and two ground pins
(G, S, G)). The drawback to using pins on the vertical circuit
board 405 to interconnect radio frequency signals between the
vertical circuit board 405 and the horizontal circuit board 410 is
related to the feasibility of high volume production and at low
cost. Indeed, since the ground pins are required to be very close
to the signal pin in order to minimize impedance mismatching, this
requirement is incompatible with the low cost technologies and
materials, and the large fabrication tolerances used for set top
box manufacturing.
[0009] FIG. 5 depicts two circuit boards interconnected using a
single pin 12 and having a filtering pattern that enables a
wideband interconnect. The use of a single circuit board pin 12
with a specific filtering pattern to enable a wideband
interconnection between two perpendicular circuit boards (10, 1)
requires a manual soldering of the ground and signal patterns.
[0010] FIG. 6 shows two circuit boards that are perpendicular to
each other and which are interconnected by one or more U-shaped
metal clips. The clips include a planar baseplate to be soldered
onto the horizontal circuit board signal pad or ground pad, and two
arms bent in a way to provide a spring effect and thus to make the
U-shaped ends come in contact with the vertical circuit board.
Despite the low cost offered by this solution, its disadvantage is
a minimum of two clips are required, one clip to transmit the
signal and a second clip to transmit the ground between the two
circuit boards. Also, since the distance between signal and ground
clips must be accurately ensured, low cost processes are
incompatible with this solution.
SUMMARY
[0011] The proposed apparatus is directed to a metal part that
enables the interconnection of two circuit boards (PCBs) arranged
at an angle to one another, for example, perpendicularly. The
proposed apparatus aims to transmit a radio frequency (RF) signal
in a wide frequency range, addressing for instance WLAN
applications in both the 2.4 GHZ and 5 GHz bands of the IEEE.
802.11a/b/g/n/ac standard.
[0012] The proposed interconnection device (apparatus) has been
designed in the framework of the development of small size
set-top-boxes (STB) which integration constraints require the use
of several circuits boards (e.g., printed circuit boards (PCBs))
interconnected with each other. The proposed interconnection
apparatus (device) is described in terms of a set top box, but is
not so limited, and may include gateways, smart home devices, home
networking device or any other electronic device that has circuit
boards that must be interconnected in such a manner as to couple a
first transmission signal on a first circuit board with a third
transmission signal on a second circuit board.
[0013] The proposed interconnection device (apparatus) offers an
interconnection solution that sets out to address the above
described disadvantages of conventional solutions. In a particular
embodiment the proposed interconnection device (apparatus) includes
a surface mountable single metal clip capable of interconnecting
the radio frequency signals from a first circuit board and a second
circuit board and the grounding signal from a board-to-board
interconnection.
[0014] A radio frequency interconnection device is described
including a first part of the radio frequency interconnection
device being disposed on a first circuit board and a second part of
the radio frequency interconnection device disposed on a second
circuit board.
[0015] The first part of the radio frequency interconnection device
includes a first transmission line connected to ground at a first
I/O port. It should be noted that the first transmission line and
second transmission line may be a micro-strip line, a strip-line, a
coplanar line or a multilayer line. In the description herein
micro-strip line will be used as an example and should not be taken
as limiting. Micro-strip line and transmission line may also be
used interchangeably in the description herein. The first
transmission line is connected to an intermediate terminating pad,
the intermediate terminating pad being spaced apart from a first
grounding pad and a second transmission line is connected to the
first transmission line. The second part of the radio frequency
interconnection device includes a third micro-strip line that is a
U-shape connected to a second grounding pad. The second grounding
pad is located directly above the first grounding pad. The third
micro-strip line is also connected to an output line at an
intersection point.
[0016] The first part of the radio frequency interconnection device
is attached to the second part of the radio frequency
interconnection device with two baseplates. A first baseplate being
between the first grounding pad and the second grounding pad and a
second baseplate being between the intersection point and the
intermediate terminating pad. The baseplates provide an air gap
between the first circuit board and the second circuit board. Both
the first circuit board and the second circuit board have a ground
plane.
[0017] The first transmission line 925 is about half-wavelength
long and may be straight or meandering. The second transmission
line 935 is about quarter-wavelength long and may be straight or
meandering
[0018] The first circuit board and the second circuit board are
orthogonal to each other. The first circuit board may be horizontal
and the second circuit board may be vertical or the first circuit
board may be vertical and the second circuit board may be
horizontal.
[0019] The intermediate terminating pad is spaced apart from the
first grounding pad by between 100 and 200 .mu.m.
[0020] At an output port of the second circuit board, a shunt
element (short circuit stub line) enables an interconnection
between the first circuit board and the second circuit board. From
the input port to the output port the circuit exhibits a bandpass
type filtering response.
[0021] An electronic device includes a plurality of circuit boards
any pair of which are interconnected using a radio frequency
interconnection device according to any the above.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0022] The proposed method and apparatus is best understood from
the following detailed description when read in conjunction with
the accompanying drawings. The drawings include the following
figures briefly described below:
[0023] FIG. 1 depicts a device having several circuit boards that
are perpendicular to each other and are interconnected using
conventional Peripheral Component Interconnect express (PCIe)
connectors.
[0024] FIG. 2 shows a set top box (STB) having several circuit
boards that are perpendicular to each other and are interconnected
using conventional Peripheral Component Interconnect express (PCIe)
connectors.
[0025] FIG. 3 depicts two circuit boards that are arranged parallel
to each other and which are interconnected using a metal part, an
element of which is coupled to the board-to-board (B2B) grounding
screw.
[0026] FIG. 4 shows two circuit boards that are perpendicular to
each other and which are interconnected by pins integrated into the
vertical circuit board.
[0027] FIG. 5 depicts two circuit boards interconnected using a
single pin and having a filtering pattern that enables a wideband
interconnect.
[0028] FIG. 6 shows two circuit boards that are perpendicular to
each other and which are interconnected by one or more U-shaped
metal clips.
[0029] FIG. 7 is an exemplary design of a symmetric radio frequency
wideband bandpass filter in accordance with the embodiments of the
invention.
[0030] FIG. 8 shows the filter response for the exemplary symmetric
radio frequency wideband bandpass filter of FIG. 7.
[0031] FIG. 9 illustrates an exemplary symmetric radio frequency
wideband bandpass filter in accordance with embodiments of the
invention.
[0032] FIG. 10 shows the behavior for the exemplary symmetric radio
frequency wideband bandpass filter of FIG. 9.
[0033] FIG. 11 shows a first portion of the exemplary symmetric
radio frequency wideband bandpass filter. The first portion does
not include TL3 or the output line.
[0034] FIG. 12 shows the second (remaining) portion of the
exemplary symmetric radio frequency wideband bandpass filter
including TL3 and the output line and on a second circuit
board.
[0035] FIG. 13 shows a close-up sectional view of the
interconnection between orthogonal circuit boards using an
embodiment of the proposed apparatus, with an air gap separating
the circuit boards in order to avoid a short-circuit.
[0036] FIG. 14 shows an embodiment of the proposed interconnection
device (apparatus), wherein TL3 can be considered to be a single
metal part with two baseplates (on two circuit boards).
[0037] FIG. 15 shows the response and performance of an embodiment
of the proposed interconnection device (apparatus).
[0038] FIG. 16 is an exemplary embodiment of the proposed
interconnection device (apparatus).
[0039] FIG. 17 is a block diagram of a media device such as a set
top box.
[0040] It should be understood that the drawing(s) are for purposes
of illustrating the concepts of the disclosure and is not
necessarily the only possible configuration for illustrating the
disclosure.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0041] The present description illustrates the principles of the
present disclosure. It will thus be appreciated that those skilled
in the art will be able to devise various arrangements that,
although not explicitly described or shown herein, embody the
principles of the disclosure and are included within its scope.
[0042] All examples and conditional language recited herein are
intended for educational purposes to aid the reader in
understanding the principles of the disclosure and the concepts
contributed by the inventor to furthering the art, and are to be
construed as being without limitation to such specifically recited
examples and conditions.
[0043] Moreover, all statements herein reciting principles,
aspects, and embodiments of the disclosure, as well as specific
examples thereof, are intended to encompass both structural and
functional equivalents thereof. Additionally, it is intended that
such equivalents include both currently known equivalents as well
as equivalents developed in the future, i.e., any elements
developed that perform the same function, regardless of
structure.
[0044] Thus, for example, it will be appreciated by those skilled
in the art that the block diagrams presented herein represent
conceptual views of illustrative circuitry embodying the principles
of the disclosure. Similarly, it will be appreciated that any flow
charts, flow diagrams, state transition diagrams, pseudocode, and
the like represent various processes which may be substantially
represented in computer readable media and so executed by a
computer or processor, whether or not such computer or processor is
explicitly shown.
[0045] The functions of the various elements shown in the figures
may be provided through the use of dedicated hardware as well as
hardware capable of executing software in association with
appropriate software. When provided by a processor, the functions
may be provided by a single dedicated processor, by a single shared
processor, or by a plurality of individual processors, some of
which may be shared. Moreover, explicit use of the term "processor"
or "controller" should not be construed to refer exclusively to
hardware capable of executing software, and may implicitly include,
without limitation, digital signal processor (DSP) hardware, read
only memory (ROM) for storing software, random access memory (RAM),
and nonvolatile storage.
[0046] Other hardware, conventional and/or custom, may also be
included. Similarly, any switches shown in the figures are
conceptual only. Their function may be carried out through the
operation of program logic, through dedicated logic, through the
interaction of program control and dedicated logic, or even
manually, the particular technique being selectable by the
implementer as more specifically understood from the context.
[0047] In the claims hereof, any element expressed as a means for
performing a specified function is intended to encompass any way of
performing that function including, for example, a) a combination
of circuit elements that performs that function or b) software in
any form, including, therefore, firmware, microcode or the like,
combined with appropriate circuitry for executing that software to
perform the function. The disclosure as defined by such claims
resides in the fact that the functionalities provided by the
various recited means are combined and brought together in the
manner which the claims call for. It is thus regarded that any
means that can provide those functionalities are equivalent to
those shown herein.
[0048] The proposed interconnection device (apparatus) is described
below step by step from the origin of the idea to the application
to an example of realization.
[0049] FIG. 7 is an exemplary design of a symmetric radio frequency
wideband bandpass filter in accordance with the principles of the
proposed apparatus. The symmetric radio frequency wideband bandpass
filter of FIG. 7 includes three theoretical transmission lines
TLIN, one (TL1) connected to the input (P1) and output (P2) ports
and the two other lines (TL2, TL3) connected to the ground at their
respective I/O ports. For each TLIN, Z is defined as the
characteristic impedance of the line, E is defined as the
electrical length (in degrees) and F is defined as the related
frequency.
[0050] FIG. 8 shows the filter response for the exemplary symmetric
radio frequency wideband bandpass filter of FIG. 7. With the values
of the design of the symmetric radio frequency wideband bandpass
filter as shown in FIG. 7 and described above, the filter responses
are plotted in FIG. 8, showing a wide passing band (dB(S12)) from
2-6 GHz, with low reflection coefficient (dB(S11)<-20 dB). This
is in the ideal case.
[0051] FIG. 9 illustrates an exemplary symmetric radio frequency
wideband bandpass filter in accordance with the principles of the
proposed apparatus when it is provided on a planar board. Using
micro-strip lines printed onto a low-cost fiberglass reinforced
epoxy (FR4) based multilayer substrate, results in the circuit
presented in FIG. 9, with first transmission line 925 (TL1) length
at around 20 mm, i.e. half-wavelength at 4 GHz. First transmission
line 925 (TL1) is connected to input port 915 (P1) and output port
920 (P2). Second transmission line 935 (TL2) is connected to first
transmission line 925 (TL1). Third transmission line 930 (TL3) is
also connected to first transmission line 925 (TL1). Third
transmission line 930 (TL3) terminates in grounded via-hole 910.
Transmission lines 935 (TL2) and 930 (TL3) are shunt elements (and
are also called short circuit stub lines). Straight lines are used
here, but, of course, the lines can meander in order to
significantly compact the design.
[0052] FIG. 10 shows the behavior for the exemplary symmetric radio
frequency wideband bandpass filter of FIG. 9. With the filter shown
in FIG. 9 and described above, the behavior shown in FIG. 10 is
close to the behavior of the ideal filter of FIG. 7, with naturally
higher insertion loss (due to mainly to the high dielectric loss of
the FR4 substrate, Df.about.0.02).
[0053] From the above described single horizontal planar filter, it
is possible to consider placing a portion of the filter network in
a second plane, for instance, onto a vertical circuit board. The
proposed interconnection device (apparatus) includes placing the
shunt element (short circuit stub line) TL3 on the vertical circuit
board to provide the interconnection between the two circuit boards
using only a single metal part disposed on two perpendicular
circuit boards.
[0054] FIG. 11 shows a first portion of the exemplary symmetric
radio frequency wideband bandpass filter. The first portion of the
exemplary symmetric radio frequency wideband bandpass filter is
disposed on a first circuit board 1105 having a ground plane 1110.
Input port 1115 is connected to first transmission line 1130 (TL1).
First transmission line 1130 (TL1) of the filter terminates in
intermediate terminating pad 1120 (P2i). Grounding pad 1125 (PG1)
is spaced apart from intermediate terminating pad 1120 (P2i). The
first part of the filter on the first circuit board may be realized
using other transmission lines such as strip-lines, coplanar lines,
multilayer lines as well as micro-strip lines subject to the
constraint that grounding pad 1125 and intermediate terminating pad
1120 are printed on the top layer of the first circuit board. The
first portion does not include TL3 or the output line. The distance
between PG1 and P2i is in the range of 100-200 .mu.m depending on
the frequency range of operation.
[0055] FIG. 12 shows the second (remaining) portion of the
exemplary symmetric radio frequency wideband bandpass filter
including TL3 and the output line on a second circuit board, the
second circuit board being orthogonal to the first circuit board.
TL3 is formed in an inverted narrow U-shape so that coming from the
intermediate terminating pad P2i it returns to the ground pad PG1.
On the second circuit board, TL3 is in contact with the output port
P2 at an intersection point C and with a ground pad PG2 located
above PG1. The elements of the first circuit board are indicated
with the same reference indicia as on FIG. 11 and will not be
described again. The second circuit board 1205 has a ground plane
1210. Third transmission line 1220 (TL3) is a shunt element (short
circuit stub line). It should be noted that third transmission line
1220 (TL3) may be another shape than an inverted U-shape as
described above provided that connections 1125, 1120, 1225 and C
are ensured. Output port 1215 (P2) is in contact with third
transmission line 1220 (TL3) at intersection point C. Grounding pad
1225 (PG2) is located above grounding pad 1125 (PG1).
[0056] Any kind of filter circuit may be applied provided the
circuit contains, at the output port, a short-circuit stub line
(shunt element) (TL3) that enables realization of the
interconnection with the perpendicular circuit board (e.g., printed
circuit board (PCB)).
[0057] FIG. 13 shows a close-up sectional view of the
interconnection between the first and second orthogonal circuit
boards using an embodiment of the proposed apparatus, with an air
gap separating the first and second circuit boards in order to
avoid a short-circuit. TL3 can now be considered as a single metal
part with two baseplates soldered to the respective pads PG1 and
P2i printed on the first circuit board, as illustrated in FIG. 14,
which shows the proposed interconnection device (apparatus),
wherein TL3 can be considered a single metal part with two
baseplates (on two circuit boards) perpendicular to each other. The
various elements of FIG. 13 are labeled with the same reference
indicia as used to label the elements in FIGS. 11 and 12. At this
point, TL3 should be considered as an electrical model designed to
prove the concept. High volume realization methods are described
below.
[0058] The entire circuit as described above and shown in FIG. 12
has been simulated using a 3D electromagnetic simulation tool as
proof-of-concept. FIG. 15 shows the response and performance of the
proposed interconnection device (apparatus). As can be seen from
FIG. 15 the response and performance are similar to a uni-planar
filter (FIG. 10). The achieved performances in term of bandwidth
enable the proposed interconnection device (apparatus) to be
applied to dual-band WLAN applications, up to 6 GHz.
[0059] The proposed interconnection device (apparatus) can be
fabricated using a well-known stamping process and there are
several ways to interconnect the different pins to the circuit
board and to the metal plate. One such fabrication of the proposed
interconnection device (apparatus) is illustrated in FIG. 16, where
curved strips are introduced in order provide the requested
flexibility to ensure the contact with grounding pad 1225 (PG2) and
intersection point C disposed on the second circuit board.
Grounding pad 1125 (PG1) and intermediate terminating pad 1120
(P2i) are disposed on the first circuit board.
[0060] FIG. 17 is an example block diagram of the media device 1700
of FIG. 2. A media device is an electronic device such as, but not
limited to, a set top box. The block diagram configuration includes
a bus-oriented 1750 configuration interconnecting a processor 1720,
and a memory 1745. The configuration of FIG. 17 also includes a
network interface 1705 and may include either a wired or a wireless
interface or both.
[0061] Processor 1720 provides computation functions for the media
device, such as the one depicted in FIG. 2. The processor 1720 can
be any form of CPU or controller that utilizes communications
between elements of the media device to control communication and
computation processes. Those of skill in the art recognize that bus
1750 provides a communication path between the various elements of
embodiment 1700 and that other point-to-point interconnection
options (e.g. non-bus architecture) are also feasible.
[0062] User interface and display 1710 is driven by interface
circuit 1715. The interface 1710 is used as a multimedia interface
having both audio and video capability to display streamed or
downloaded audio and/or video and/or multimedia content obtained
via network interface 1725 and connection 1705 to a network.
[0063] Memory 1745 can act as a repository for memory related to
any of the methods that incorporate the functionality of the media
device. Memory 1745 can provide the repository for storage of
information such as program memory, downloads, uploads, or
scratchpad calculations as well as the storage of streamed or
downloaded content including audio, video and multimedia content.
Those of skill in the art will recognize that memory 1745 may be
incorporated all or in part of processor 1720. Network interface
1725 has both receiver and transmitter elements for communication
as known to those of skill in the art.
[0064] Network interface 1725 may include a wireless interface to
communicate wirelessly to transmit requests for audio and/or video
and/or multimedia content and receive the requested audio and/or
video and/or multimedia content. In order to do so, a radio
frequency interface may be provided. The radio frequency interface
transmits and receives using an antenna, which may use a radio
frequency wideband bandpass filter. The radio frequency wideband
bandpass filter circuit may be split across two circuit boards,
which are orthogonal to each other. The orthogonal circuit boards
may use the interconnection device depicted in FIGS. 12 and 13 and
described above.
[0065] Any other filter networks terminated by a shunt (short
circuit stub line) transmission line, such as the example
considered herein, can use the proposed interconnection device.
[0066] It is to be understood that the proposed method and
apparatus may be implemented in various forms of hardware,
software, firmware, special purpose processors, or a combination
thereof. Special purpose processors may include application
specific integrated circuits (ASICs), reduced instruction set
computers (RISCs) and/or field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs).
Preferably, the proposed method and apparatus is implemented as a
combination of hardware and software. Moreover, the software is
preferably implemented as an application program tangibly embodied
on a program storage device. The application program may be
uploaded to, and executed by, a machine comprising any suitable
architecture. Preferably, the machine is implemented on a computer
platform having hardware such as one or more central processing
units (CPU), a random access memory (RAM), and input/output (I/O)
interface(s). The computer platform also includes an operating
system and microinstruction code. The various processes and
functions described herein may either be part of the
microinstruction code or part of the application program (or a
combination thereof), which is executed via the operating system.
In addition, various other peripheral devices may be connected to
the computer platform such as an additional data storage device and
a printing device.
[0067] It should be understood that the elements shown in the
figures may be implemented in various forms of hardware, software
or combinations thereof. Preferably, these elements are implemented
in a combination of hardware and software on one or more
appropriately programmed general-purpose devices, which may include
a processor, memory and input/output interfaces. Herein, the phrase
"coupled" is defined to mean directly connected to or indirectly
connected with through one or more intermediate components. Such
intermediate components may include both hardware and software
based components.
[0068] It is to be further understood that, because some of the
constituent system components and method steps depicted in the
accompanying figures are preferably implemented in software, the
actual connections between the system components (or the process
steps) may differ depending upon the manner in which the proposed
method and apparatus is programmed. Given the teachings herein, one
of ordinary skill in the related art will be able to contemplate
these and similar implementations or configurations of the proposed
method and apparatus.
[0069] For purposes of this application and the claims, using the
exemplary phrase "at least one of A, B and C," the phrase means
"only A, or only B, or only C, or any combination of A, B and
C."
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